The Ijiraq
by twinkinu
Summary: The niblings are abducted by a monster in the forest, and the grunkles will stop at nothing to get them back. Then, they help them cope with the aftermath. / "I like to know where I am. Even if I don't know where I am, I like to know THAT. If we go there's no knowing." "No knowing what?" "If we'll ever come back." —Tom Stoppard, "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead"
1. Perception

_This fic is mostly gonna be hurt/comfort and protective grunkles, but the first few chapters will be adventure and suspense and etc because I want to establish a good plot (and also practice my adventure and suspense writing because i am not good at it at all)_

 _helpful hint: "Ijiraq" is pronounced like "EE-yuh-rack," and the messages at the end of each chapter will be in a basic +3 ceasar cipher_

 _happy reading, and please remember to leave reviews!_

* * *

"I wonder how long we've been walking," Mabel mused, twirling around as she skipped through the deep woods. Trees stretched far above the twins until they disappeared into a cloudy sky, painted a heavy gray with mist and fog as crystal snow rained down on them. Suddenly, she gasped, a broad smile finding its way to her face. "What if we find the unicorns again?! I won't let that good-for-nothin' Smell-lestabelle get away alive this time! I'll get to use those new punches Grunkle Stan taught me!" She threw a couple of uppercuts into the air to demonstrate.

Dipper hummed momentarily as if considering the possibility, but then he looked up from his navy blue journal and shook his head. "No, Grunkle Ford said that unicorns take at least two years to resurface after encounters with humans."

"Aw, poo! Well, at least it's really pretty out here."

She was right; the forest was coated thickly with bright white snow that glowed a gentle blue through the mist of the foggy afternoon. She resumed walking as Dipper thoughtfully sketched the view of winter conifers onto a blank page in his journal.

"Still, though, I don't think we've ever been this deep in the forest before."

That gave Dipper pause. He looked back up and glanced around warily, starting to rapidly click his pen. It was true—he didn't recognize where they were.

The twins had arrived in Gravity Falls for the first time nineteen months ago, when they spent the summer there. They visited again for winter break that year, then again for spring break, then _again_ for their second summer. Now, it was the twins' second winter in Gravity Falls—their fifth visit overall. They knew every last part of the forest.

 _Nothing_ should have been unfamiliar.

He tried to calm himself; everything would be okay as long as they had a horizon, a sense of direction, a method of determining which way's which. But Dipper carefully noted the thick fog all around him and began to realize he wasn't sure that they had any horizon, anymore.

"Where's the sun?"

"Right here!" Mabel quipped, spinning around to grin brightly at her brother and point at herself with two thumbs. Her face fell, though, when she saw the concerned expression on Dipper's face. "What's wrong, bro-bro?"

"Where's the sun?" he asked again, voice even and patient in a forced way that Mabel recognized. It was the sort of voice that meant Dipper was thinking too much again. It was paranoia and desperate control of tone, because he knew that if he let his voice show the anxiety creeping up, it would become real all too quickly.

She wanted to answer his question definitively to help ease his mind, but she looked up and the fog was thicker than ever, the clouds low and dense and dark. There was no sun in sight. The hairs pricked up on the back of her neck and she scrambled for a bright side (ha, a bright side to the lack of brightness—that would've been hilarious under different circumstances). "Who needs the dumb ol' sun, anyway? Don'tcha have your compass?"

Momentary relief crossed the boy twin's face as he remembered his compass and reached into the pocket of his coat to retrieve it, but the smile faded instantly when he looked at it and found the needle spinning uncontrollably around its bearing. He sighed shakily, turning it to show Mabel what it was doing. "The compass has been compromised."

"Compass-mised?" she tried weakly. Her shoulders slumped in defeat when Dipper only shot her a scowl. "Okay, yeah, that wasn't my best work. But don't worry about it! I'm sure my puns will get better on our way back to the Mystery Shack!"

"Which way _is_ the Mystery Shack, Mabel?"

"Uh, that's easy! It's-"

The fourteen-year-old tensed when she saw something move in her peripherals. Her right hand hovered instinctively over her grappling hook.

"Mabel?! Did you see something?!"

The answer was yes. At first, Mabel was sure of it. She had seen something, a quick little flash of movement, a brush of darkness against the stark white of a snowy December tangle of trees. It was _real,_ it was _there,_ and it was black like coal.

Or... was it grey, like ash?

Or... was it blue, like smoke?

Or... was it colorless, like air?

Like nothing?

It must have been nothing.

She looked all around her but whatever she had seen was gone, or it had never been there in the first place. It must have been her imagination.

"No... No, I guess not."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah!"

"No, you're not."

"Why does it matter?"

"Because whatever you saw could be _dangerous!_ If we've never been this deep in the forest before, that means the creatures we find out here might not be anything we've ever seen! They could be-" He jumped and whipped his head around when a shadow brushed around the corner of his eye.

"New," Mabel breathed, finishing her brother's sentence. "You saw it too, didn't you?"

Dipper held his eyes wide open, walking backward in cautious circles and searching for what he saw. But nothing was there. He knew that something had been there, he was _certain_ of it. It was _real_ , it was _there_ , and it was black like earth.

Or... was it grey, like dust?

Or... was it blue, like wind?

Or... was it colorless, like air?

Like nothing?

But it _couldn't_ have been nothing.

Because _Mabel saw it too._

* * *

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	2. Quotation

Dipper thought back to the play he'd read this past semester on Grunkle Ford's recommendation. He'd complained over video chat that the assigned works in his English class weren't keeping him engaged, and Ford's face had lit up with enthusiasm as he asked, 'Have you read _Hamlet?'_ then, once Dipper had replied in the affirmative, 'Are you familiar with Tom Stoppard's work?' then, when he'd replied in the negative, 'Oh, you simply _must_ look into _Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead!'_

Grunkle Stan had rolled his eyes. 'Ya don't gotta read that crap, Dipper. I was a senior in highschool when they made us read it and it didn't make any sense.'

'You couldn't make sense of it because you didn't _try,_ Stanley! He's a brilliant and inquisitive boy. He'll love this! Listen, Dipper, it's a genius work. It may take some time to muddle through, but it's hilarious and tragic and, best of all, it makes you _think!_ '

'There aren't any babes, Dipper—none at all! And _no_ good fight scenes.'

'Who needs sex and violence when you have _wit_ and _rhetoric_ and _absurdism-'_

They had by then broken off into their usual bickering, but Dipper was already looking the play up and ordering a copy off Amazon.

He thought back to that play now, the lines he'd committed to memory, dissecting their clever themes and existential philosophy.

Mabel wasn't handling her brother's silence well. "Dipper," she pressed. "You saw it too, didn't you?"

The boy took a shaky breath. "A man breaking his journey between one place and another at a third place with no name, character, population, or significance sees a unicorn cross his path and disappear," he recited, reaching out for Mabel's hand and grasping it protectively. "That in itself is startling, but there's precedents for mystical encounters of various kinds... There's a choice of persuasions to put it down to fancy."

"Uh, what? Dipper, you said we wouldn't see any unicorns-"

" _Until—"_ he continued, squeezing her hand. "'My God,' says a second man, 'I must be dreaming; I thought I saw a unicorn.' At which point, a dimension is added that makes the experience as alarming as it'll ever be."

An invasive silence followed. Then, Mabel realized. "Oh... So, if we _both_ saw it-"

"That means it's not nothing."

Mabel tried desperately to muster some sort of confidence or bravery. The Mystery Twins were strong, tough, and smart. There was nothing they couldn't handle. They'd defeated Bill freaking Cipher, for Moses' sakes! They should be able to handle some silly monster in the woods!

But... they'd never encountered an enemy they couldn't _see._

This was new. This was different. This eluded their perception, leaving them with nothing but uncertainty. They didn't know how big it was, or how strong or how smart or how powerful. They couldn't run, because they had no idea of its location. If they ran, they may be running straight into its arms...

Or claws...

Or _teeth..._

They were lost.

Dipper was just as infuriated by that thought as Mabel was terrified—they _couldn't_ have been lost. They knew every inch of this forest. They weren't as well-versed in its topography as they might have been if Ford were able to show them around – the grunkles had been at sea since Weirdmageddon, so they hadn't seen each other outside the context of photographs and Skype calls for almost a year and a half – but regardless, the last time they stumbled upon an unfamiliar part of the forest was last winter.

An unknown creature was one thing. It could easily be explained why the twins had never encountered this thing before; monsters and animals were elusive and could run, hide, stay out of sight. But geography? Geography stayed the same, only changing substantially in the event of a natural disaster, and there hadn't been any natural disasters here recently, so why were they so _lost?_

Another shadow shifted the foliage in the twins' peripheral vision. This time, both saw it. They spun around, hands clasped together, but once again their eyes met nothing but pine trees and falling snow and heavy fog. No monster.

Nothing at all.

"Dipper, I think-"

Mabel's voice was cut off by a muffled scream, then her absence from Dipper's side. Her hand was ripped from his so quickly he didn't even feel it.

There was just nothingness.

The shadow darted around Dipper's peripherals and he shouted his sister's name, but nothing met his cries. His hands shook as he reached for the close-range blaster Ford had sent him for his fourteenth birthday. He needed to stay calm, like Grunkle Ford always told him to. And he needed to be tough, like Grunkle Stan always told him to. He needed to let his mind function properly so that he could accurately analyse the situation, and he needed to be ready for a fight so he could protect his sister when he found her. He muttered manically to himself, trying to stave off panic by continuing the quotation he had already started. "A third witness adds no further dimension, but only spreads it thinner-"

Another shadow. Dipper shot blindly into the wilderness but the ray disappeared into the fog. He scolded himself for shooting. _Don't get trigger-happy. Stay calm. Focus on your intellect._ His voice wavered as he continued, "And a fourth thinner s-still, and the more witnesses there are, th-the thinner it gets, until it's as thin as reality-"

Another shadow. Another being out the corner of his eye that disappeared the instant he turned his head. He threw Stoppard out the window as frustration and protectiveness took over. " _Alright, you dumb monster, whatever you are! If you don't give me back my sister, so help me, I will-!"_

Dipper's voice was cut off by a muffled scream, then his absence from the horizonless woods. His feet were torn from the snowy ground so quickly he didn't even feel it.

There was just nothingness.

* * *

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* * *

 _A/N: Alright, so I realize that R &G had just premiered in 1966, so while it definitely had existed for at least several years by the time the Stans were seniors in highschool, they probably didn't study it. But let's exercise some willful suspension of disbelief there for me, alright? It's such a good play and it's right up Ford's alley because he's a NERD and he also probably questions the meaning of life a lot (and it's right up Dipper's alley by proxy—especially with the manipulation of language)_

 _Oh, and what Dipper is saying in this chapter is not my work, but rather a sort of paraphrased quote from R &G. I think I made it pretty clear, but just to formalize it:_

 _ **I do not own** the monologue about the unicorn and the added witnesses bringing the experience closer to reality. Hats off to **Stoppard** for that little piece of existentialism. Here's the full quote:_

 _"A man breaking his journey between one place and another at a third place of no name, character, population or significance, sees a unicorn cross his path and disappear. That in itself is startling, but there are precedents for mystical encounters of various kinds, or to be less extreme, a choice of persuasions to put it down to fancy; until—'My God,' says a second man, 'I must be dreaming, I thought I saw a unicorn.' At which point, a dimension is added that makes the experience as alarming as it will ever be. A third witness, you understand, adds no further dimension but only spreads it thinner, and a fourth thinner still, and the more witnesses there are, the thinner it gets and the more reasonable it becomes until it is as thin as reality, the name we give to common experience... 'Look, look!' recites the crowd. 'A horse with an arrow in its forehead! It must have been mistaken for a deer.'"_


	3. Communication

They were going to surprise the niblings; it would've been the first time they'd seen them in over a year. They'd returned to Gravity Falls every few months, of course, but the visits never lasted long, and whenever Mabel and Dipper were in town, that was when they couldn't afford a trip.

But now, the timing was perfect. The kids were in town for winter break and the grunkles had a few weeks to hang around on land. They were gonna dock in Newport, get in the Stanleymobile (which had been kept in storage nearby), and drive straight to the Mystery Shack, where they'd surprise the kids and wrap them in the biggest hugs that two old men could muster.

But instead of seeing the kids when they pulled up to the Shack, they were met by a crying Soos—to be fair, that was completely normal; he always greeted them with a tearful embrace, even if he had seen the grunkles only a couple months ago—but this time was different. This time, Soos wasn't sobbing tears of joy and running toward the twins with open arms. This time, his tears were subdued. He hung his head in shame and nervously crossed his arms, biting down a quivering lip as Stan and Ford approached. Melody stood behind him, head low.

Stan approached them with a nervous chuckle. "Uh, hey... Why the sorry mug?"

Ford stayed behind, watching with a wary expression. No one spoke. Soos just huffed out a loud, shaky breath and continued to hide his face.

Stan frowned and took another step closer. "Soos?"

A beat of silence. Then:

"Where're the kids?"

That was what ruptured the already-crumbling wall Soos had built up. And with the dam torn down, the flood broke free.

He sobbed openly, throwing his head in his hands as he tried to explain, but his whines and whimpers were far from coherent sentences. "I- I- I'm so, s-s-s-" Break. Cough. Gasp. "M-mist-ster P-Pines, th-they- It, it's a-all my f-f-f-" Gasp. Cough. Cry. "We- I- Th-th-they-" Crack. Sob. Whine. He threw his head in his hands. "I'm so _sorry!"_

Melody gently stroked her fiance's back, looking up at the two men (with whom she still wasn't sure how to define her relationship—soon-to-be unofficially-adoptive father- and uncle-in-law? Yeah... that would work for now). She shyly stepped forward, deciding to take over the conversation while Soos worked to get himself under control. "A couple days ago, Dipper and Mabel went into the forest to do some exploring, and, well... They didn't come back." A beat of silence. Stan and Ford widened their eyes. "We were gonna call you! B-but we didn't wanna interrupt your trip... The whole town knows, and there are search parties out every day. We haven't found anything yet—but, uh..." She tapered off uncertainly and looked down at her feet.

The old men were tense. Their shoulders were too square, their jaws clenched too tight. They stood dangerously still, holding their breath as they held anxious eye contact with each other; the only movement was Stan grinding his teeth and Ford subtly cracking his knuckles while keeping both hands stiff at his sides. They just watched each other, seeming to confer silently; occasionally, one threw in a short nod or a quirked eyebrow or an eye roll.

They must have been having _some_ sort of conversation, because after a few moments, Ford spun silently around on his heel and walked back to the car, his bearing rigid and severe. He popped the trunk and rifled through it, remaining silently at work for several minutes.

As the silence stretched on, Soos' anxiety deepened to the point that eventually, he called out a hesitant, "Dr. Pines?"

But Stan shushed the younger man harshly and kept a steady eye on his brother as if he were perfectly aware of the elder twin's intentions.

Ford eventually did return. Two large duffel bags were slung over his shoulder and he now wore an extra coat, a pair of leather gloves, and a thick wool hat and scarf Mabel had knit him. In his arms he held another coat, hat, scarf, and pair of gloves. A stern look was carved into his face as he strode determinedly to his brother and shoved the winter gear into his arms. Stan accepted them wordlessly, and as he got dressed Ford began to give terse instructions in a low voice.

"You'll need to call off the search parties immediately. The forest is an incredibly dangerous place and I don't want anybody else to go missing. Dipper and Mabel are incredibly smart, strong, and capable individuals—if they've encountered something they can't handle, no one else will stand a chance."

"You're not going out there, are you?!" Melody exclaimed.

Soos put a hand on her shoulder, head down. "It is what must be done." Then, he looked up with resolve. "I'm going, too."

"No," Stan said firmly, surprising everyone with the quickness and firmness of his protest. "Sixer and I can take care of this ourselves. I don't want ya gettin' hurt."

"But it's all my fault!"

"Listen, Soos—" he slapped a firm hand down on the young man's shoulder. "Ya gotta stay in town and take care of your family and the Shack. This... This ain't your fault, okay? Ya didn't do anything wrong, son."

Soos looked up at his former boss with a hopeful glint in his wide, watery eyes. He sniffled and bit his lip. "Y-you really mean it?"

Stan offered the smallest, faintest reassuring smile as he nodded, then he stepped away and, once again stone-faced, he barked, "Now stop your cryin'—'cause they're fine. Alright? They're always fine."

And as the old men turned to the forest and headed toward a foggy unknown, Ford pretended not to notice that Stan didn't believe in his own words.

* * *

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	4. Delusion

if you haven't noticed yet, you can take the messages at the ends of the chapters, decode them, and put them all together to get a sort of poem... the first three chapters have completed the first poem, and now starts a new one! _  
_since the structure and rhyme scheme of the messages has changed, i thought it appropriate to change the cipher, as well. the messages from here on out can be decoded using atbash _  
_happy reading!

 _Dipper and mabel have been missing for approximately seventy-one hours..._

The two brothers trudged into the forest and through the snow. They'd been searching for Mabel and Dipper for over twenty-four hours by now, and Ford tried to distract himself by keeping his mind on scientific mode. He concentrated on his surroundings and calculated the implications of every detail he perceived so that he wouldn't have to consider the children's fates.

 _The amount of fog is alarming considering the snow on the ground—granted, it_ is _possible for mist or fog to form on snowy ground, but not when air temperatures remain below zero degrees Celsius..._

 _The first forty-eight hours are the most crucial when searching for missing persons..._

The dense fog had just begun to appear a matter of minutes ago, and it was impossible to see through. Soon, neither Stan nor Ford could determine which way they were going.

 _A considerable amount of humidity in the air would also be necessary for fog this thick to form, but there's no precipitation falling at the moment..._

 _The likelihood of finding missing children after seventy-two hours is incredibly slim, though it isn't unheard of..._

Something _paranormal must be causing this fog..._

 _Dipper and Mabel have been missing for approximately seventy-two hours..._

Stan pulled out his compass to check and ensure that they had at least been staying true to their course.

 _I haven't encountered anything that would have the ability to manipulate weather conditions like this; could whatever it is be intentionally hindering our ability to navigate the forest?..._

 _Statistics on missing persons and abducted children exist using data exclusively collected from cases where children were kidnapped by fellow humans, while in this case the most probable scenario is that something paranormal took the children..._

 _I can hardly see Stanley through this fog. Get closer to Stanley. Don't lose sight of Stanley..._

 _Have the children been taken, or perhaps attacked and injured? No, injury implies helplessness and brokenness and bleeding and seventy-two hours of injury may lead to hypothermia or death. Injury is not an option..._

 _Focus, Stanford. Don't think about this. Pay attention to your surroundings. Consider physical evidence, not hypotheticals..._

 _Dipper and Mabel have been missing for approximately seventy-three hours..._

"Hey. Earth to Poindexter." Stan snapped his fingers in front of Ford's face, causing the latter to jump into reality.

"What is it?"

Stan held up their compass to reveal to Ford that it had lost all functionality; its needle was spinning out of control. "I said the compass went to shit, so we got no way of knowin' for sure we ain't walkin' in circles here."

Ford blinked. "Fascinating," he muttered, taking the compass from his twin's hand. "A disruption in the electromagnetic field would result in the compass failing to point north, but few things could cause it to spin without direction... I wonder..." He trailed off, turning away as he brought a finger to his chin in thought. "If something took them... and it knows that we're searching..."

"Then it wouldn't want us to find 'em," Stan finished, narrowing his eyes.

Ford hummed a grim affirmative. "And if it doesn't want us to find them, that means that it-"

The author cut himself off suddenly, drawing his ray gun and whipping his head around to find where he should aim.

"Hey, woah, cool it, Sixer! What happened?"

He tensed. "Did you see that?"

"See what?"

"Something moved. Just over there—a disturbance in the fog. I saw it."

Stan hesitated, looking around in search of what his brother saw. But...

There was nothing.

He sighed and shook his head, continuing his walk forward. "Don't do this—not now. We gotta find the kids."

Ford hurried to catch up with his brother, still looking around with his weapon at the ready. "I'm serious!"

"You're seein' things again, Sixer. Pull it together. You're probably exhausted, I am too, but we gotta _focus_ -"

"Stan! Listen to me! This isn't a delusion!"

"Don't do this, Stanford."

"I _know_ I saw something!"

"Ya knew ya saw somethin' last week, too," Stan snapped.

Ford stiffened. "That was different."

The younger twin just scoffed, making the elder clench his fists.

"That was irrational! This is _different!_ This forest is a cornucopia of anomalous activity, making it perfectly plausible that I saw something that was able to evade my vision by the time I managed to turn my head for a closer look!"

"So what if it is real? Like ya said, this place is weird! Don't get so hung up on one little thing ya might've saw."

"Seen," the author instinctively corrected, still glancing around uncertainly. "I don't know, Stan, something seems... Off."

"Everythin' seems off," Stan griped under his breath. "It doesn't matter. The kids're what matter."

"What if the thing I saw is what took them?"

"Dammit, Ford, couldja stop being paranoid for one damn minute and just _focus_ -"

Suddenly, Stan tensed, his eyes going wide. He scanned the area around him but all he saw was green trees fading into grey fog fading into white ground in a steady gradation that left him with no certainty of where the earth ended and the sky began.

"Stanley?! Did you see it?"

He had. He'd seen _something,_ anyway, whether it was Ford's thing or not. At least... He _thought_ he'd seen something... No, no, he _had,_ he was _certain_ of it. It was _real_ , it was _there_ , and it was black like the trenches.

Or... was it grey, like the Arctic sea?

Or... was it blue, like ocean spray?

Or... was it colorless, like air?

Like nothing?

But it _couldn't_ have been nothing.

Because _Stanford saw it too._

* * *

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	5. Identification

The twins stood back to back, Ford with his ray gun at the ready, Stan with his body lowered in a boxing stance.

"I told you it was real," the elder muttered bitterly.

"Can it, Sixer," the younger hissed. "We can play I-told-ya-so when we get the kids back from this thing!"

"The thing is," Ford pointed out, "if we can't even _see_ it, how do you suppose we _speak_ to it?"

Stan rolled his eyes. "With our _mouths,_ Brainiac." Then, he called out into the haze: "Hey, monster-thing! Where's my kids?! C'mon, I know ya don't wanna fight me! Anyone who's gotta hide around like a dumb shadow obviously ain't packin' a good punch!"

"Must you _taunt_ it, Stanley?"

"Don't ask questions ya already know the answers to, Poindexter."

Gradually, but quickly, the haze faded. The fog dematerialized and left a crystal-clear view of the forest around them, glittering snow and tall, sharp pine trees coming into focus. Stan smirked. "Ya got a body, or what?"

From between two trees, a creature emerged, the body of a tall, sickly thin man with the head of a great caribou. Stan wrinkled his nose. "Ya aren't the prettiest box in the candy store, are ya, Slick?"

Ford stepped toward the monster, raygun extended. "Where are the children?"

" _Home,"_ the creature answered calmly, showing no apparent reaction to the weapon in its face. " _Do not worry. They are safe."_

"What the hell does _safe_ even mean?!" Stan demanded. "Do they have food?! Water?! _Heat?!"_

" _Oh. Do humans need all those things? Such fragile creatures you are..."_

Ford's voice was firm with the front he'd put up, but he was unable to hide his fear when he half-choked, "Are they alive?"

" _I don't know. I don't check on them constantly,"_ The creature made a noise, something in the uncanny valley between a distorted, inhuman bark and an incredulous laugh. " _We take them, then we let them be. That is our way."_

"Yeah, and who's 'we?'" Stan snarled.

" _The Ijirait."_

"If you don't care about them, then give them back!" Ford growled, taking a step forward.

"Make me."

"Oh, you son of a bitch," Stan sneered, cracking his knuckles. "I'm gonna have _so much fun_ fulfillin' that request."

* * *

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* * *

 _A/N: [whispers] ijirait is the plural form of ijiraq_


	6. Illumination

Darkness. Tall, sleek walls sloping inward, making them impossible to climb. No doors. No holes. No windows. No out at all.

No food. No light. No heat. No sounds.

They only had each other. Each other and a deep, dark, dank, imposing nothingness for hours, and then for days, and then time meant nothing because _nothing_ meant _anything_ and _everything_ was always the _same_ ; nothing _changed._

Until it did.

Until there were lights.

And there were voices.

And there was _warmth._

* * *

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